


What it means to be a hero

by Goonlalagoon



Series: Just a bunch of kids with badges [4]
Category: Leagues and Legends - E. Jade Lomax
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-05
Updated: 2017-08-05
Packaged: 2018-12-11 13:34:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11715429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Goonlalagoon/pseuds/Goonlalagoon
Summary: When Rupert Hammersfield the Seventh was declared missing, presumed dead, Rhones stepped quietly into his role as general support to the headmaster, who had gone grey and grim with grief. The piles of extra paperwork on his desk were not welcome, but Rhones was used to gritting his teeth and getting on with the job that needed doing - hard rides through heavy rain to answer summons, striding into a nest of Things, shaking the hands of young heroes when they graduated and set out on their first League duty, knowing some of them would never come home again.- A character piece for Rhones, ft. Tessa "Terence" Farris.





	What it means to be a hero

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr prompt from storieswritteninthesand on Tumblr for something with Rhones. I tried to start writing something a few times, then reread the RtD chapter 'The Scions of House Farris', and realised it also sort of needed to be about Tessa, and got it written by the end of the day.

When Rupert Hammersfield the Seventh was declared missing, presumed dead, Rhones stepped quietly into his role as general support to the headmaster, who had gone grey and grim with grief. The piles of extra paperwork on his desk were not welcome, but Rhones was used to gritting his teeth and getting on with the job that needed doing - hard rides through heavy rain to answer summons, striding into a nest of Things, shaking the hands of young heroes when they graduated and set out on their first League duty, knowing some of them would never come home again.

He flipped through stacks of old paper to check there was nothing outstanding to deal with and get to grips with Rupert’s filing system. He paused when he found old applications with two names he recognised and one he didn’t. Terence Farris sat by the window in most classes, often looking a touch bored, and handed in essays that were mediocre. Terence frustrated Rhones, because in those essays and the few times the lad had joint in group discussions there had been flashes of insight and potential. Sometimes he had to check he was grading fairly and not expecting Jack’s impassioned work just because they were family.

But in Rupert’s careful ring binder there were three applications to join the Academy in that year’s intake from a Farris. Two, one sage and one hero, were stamped with “accepted” in the top right hand corner. The third had “Rejected” in bold red, and in neat script under the stamp was listed the section of the Academy regulations the application didn’t meet. Rhones wondered idly how much longer that stricture would apply, now that there were female guides, sages and mages taking extra-curricular combat lessons and proving they were perfectly capable of applying their skills in the field, thank you very much.

Under the stamp for rejected was the green circle that indicated the girl had been offered a place as a guide major instead. Rhones would have done the same - it was a strong enough application to merit it. He wondered whether Rupert had done what he’d do as well, and include a note suggesting she speak to her cousin about his guide studies and his exact timetable. He knew without a doubt that Rupert would also have seen right through the blithe ‘explanation’ of a younger sibling altering the name on the original application as a joke, re-applying for heroics under the name of Terence.

He refiled the papers and didn’t mention it to Heads.

When Terence next stared out of the window at the practice fields, longingly, he gave her extra work as punishment - no more and no less than any of his other students would get for persistent inattention. He set the essay topic as “What does it mean to be a hero, and what does a hero bring to the League”. It was one he’d used before, though usually when students were more actively disruptive or skipped out on work. He wanted to know why the girl had decided hiding for two years was worth it, and hopefully for her to understand how he was helping her get there once she thought critically about the role. He also didn’t want her grades to fall low enough that Heads decided to review her application. The headmaster was hidebound and had a tendency to see what he expected to, but he was observant enough to notice an extra Farris application and recognise the handwriting. Heads also expected things from anyone named Farris, 'trouble’ probably right at the top of the list. Rhones had expectations too, and some of them included the headmaster’s definition of troublemaking. Jack had been a lot of things, and a headache for the people actually running the Academy had at several times been one of them.

Despite not officially being part of the class, Jack had been one of Rhones’ favourite students. Then again, the boy was interested enough in historical tactics and strategies to scale the outside of a building to listen to Rhones’ lectures, which was always going to give him a certain added appeal as a student. Rhones had taught enough bored heroics and combat majors who didn’t care to grasp why studying history was vital to their futures to appreciate those who understood from the start, even if they weren’t supposed to.

He had seen and known enough guides and sages not come home because they had no defence other than to hope for the rest of the League to reach them in time to be nothing but glad and furiously proud when he heard about the stable loft shenanigans. He kept sternly quiet while Heads ranted about tradition and systems until his old friend had let off enough steam to listen, said “I can’t help but wonder whether if Jamie had known half as much about self defence as any of those kids he’d still be here”, and let himself quietly out of the headmaster’s office. They rarely spoke about their lost guide, from their first shared league, though they visited his memorial every year and forced themselves to remember the good times, rather than just carrying him home to be buried. A blow to the head from a panicked, cornered thug. A bad fall he didn’t know how to take.

Three trained, competent league-men who hadn’t known how to do any first aid because their guide was supposed to be there to do it for them, and one mage laid low by an elsewhere storm, unable to stubbornly pour power into the dying body to buy them time. Heads had caused a ruckus when he insisted on all specs getting a crash course in first aid once he became headmaster, even though every leagueman who lasted more than a month out of the Academy picked it up on the job in any case. Rhones had regular, mostly friendly debates with him about the potential advantages of pooling some of the other training from all the majors, not just the first few emergency field care sessions from the guide syllabus, but had made no progress.

Rhones knew perfectly well that banning the loft group wouldn’t stop it, so he just took care not to notice students sneaking by his office at odd hours and made sure to emphasise in his lectures any time old field reports spoke of training local recruits for defence. His principles wouldn’t allow him to up the grade of any of the heroes and combat specs he knew helped out, or lower those of the ones he knew tried to stop them. Instead he found almost arbitrary, pointless tasks to set or common actions to drop out rewards and punishment, praise and admonishments for, rewarding helpfulness and willingness to go above and beyond, denouncing bullying and the attitude that others didn’t have a right to the defence of their own two hands.

After the first battle for Driftwood island he had raged and wept because students had gone out to face things they were not ready for - things they could never have been made ready for - and because he had thought he would not have to think about their funerals, their unfinished stories, until he shook their hands and gave them badges. He wept because they had gritted their teeth and done the job in front of them. He wept for those who died, and for those who lived to have new flinches and nightmares, because he’d hoped they had a little longer before learning how hard the world could be.

After the second battle he wept too, for much the same reasons. He raged, for all the same reasons, and because Sez wanted to tear the Academy down, throw it all aside and start from scratch.  
“No girls as combat or heroes? No one who isn’t human? And who’s human anyway? The people here in Rivertown don’t seem to count, do they, and oh isn’t it funny how all the Forest kids want to be guides or sages, and just aren’t suited to being the ones calling the shots!” Sez was sniping, bitter, righteous on behalf of the people she walked among every day. Rhones agreed with all of her points but not her conclusion.  
“It is a flawed system, but it has its merits. Throwing it all aside and ignoring the good won’t advance anything! This is a chance for change and growth, yes, but that doesn’t mean destroying what’s there for the sake of spitting on its grave.” They glared at each other across a table at Sally-Anne’s, ignoring Sally-Anne’s rolled eyes from the counter. Sez seethed. Rhones gritted his teeth.  
“So leave, if you think I’m gonna mess your precious Leagues up, why don’t you? If it’s not your Academy any more, walk away.”  
“Oh, I don’t trust you not to throw it all away for spite. But I trust Rupert to convince you to save what’s worth keeping, and I want to be there to help it grow.”

“Sez, there’s a lot of problems with the Leagues, but they’ve done good work for a lot of people in a lot of places.” Their faces were mirrors of surprise. Rhones had expected interruption by Rupert, or perhaps Red or Jack. But it was Tessa looking between them earnestly, shoulders set and chin lifted. “They’ve got experience and a teaching system that works - people learn, Sez, even if we don’t get to learn everything we want. That’s the stuff that needs changing, the bad rules and oversights, the paperwork Rupert fudged.” She froze, realising what she had just said and who to.  
“Yes, how is your cousin Tommy, Terence? Funny prank for a five year old to play.” He lifted an eyebrow. “Out of interest, did young Mr Hammersfield suggest speaking to Jack in detail?” She nodded, puzzled, and Rhones smiled wryly, and a little smugly. “I thought he might have. You know, Jack scored the third highest grade in my final exam - though officially he didn’t take it, of course.” Sez gave the kind of sigh she had probably learnt from Rupert, and shrugged.  
“If you still have the graded paper, we could probably aware him belated dual honours, or something.”

He had talked with Jack, once, about what heroics meant, and known the boy would go far. Farris had been burning with the need to be out in the world, making a difference, and he’d known it wouldn’t be plain sailing. Rhones hadn’t realised, then, just how far he’d already come. Jack was not the first - or last - student to chafe at sitting in a classroom while there were people in need of saving. He hadn’t read anything into it, though once Jack left a neat stack of backdated field reports on his desk, a few things clicked into place.

After the barriers came down, he had gruffly asked if Jack had given up because if he showed he’d been worried about any of the students, past or present, he’d fall to pieces, and there was work to do. He blanched when he noticed Jack’s missing leg - for his insensitivity, for the realities he’d known his students would face but flinched from every damn time, and for what he knew it meant. It wasn’t uncommon to lose a limb in League work. It was rare to continue in a League once you had, particularly one as major as a leg. But Jack limped his way through the battle, held a rifle and his position, gritted his teeth and for once trusted other people to do the saving that was out of his line of sight.

When Rupert had convinced Sez of what was worth saving to build on from the old system, she cornered Rhones and rattled off a list, fingers twitching over a knotted thread, almost daring him to make suggestions. He had nodded and started a list of the things he thought needed changing: more open admission, a merged course in first year before choosing your major, and support for badly wounded Leaguemen to allow them back into a League, if they hadn’t been put off the whole business.

When Rupert Hammersfield the Seventh was declared missing, presumed dead, Rhones gritted his teeth and did the job in front of him. Sometimes being the hero meant tactics, battle plans, and drawn swords. Sometimes it meant seeing the long view, understanding that months of study to learn and improve weren’t wasted time, and doing your best to convince hot headed youngsters. Sometimes it just meant doing the paperwork, and sometimes that meant fudging it a little until you could get the system fixed.

When it was handed in, Terence’s essay on heroism was a mess of half finished thoughts and incomprehensible leaps, and was returned with more stern red ink on the page than black. But in guide green Rhones had circled the conclusion: 'being a hero means helping people, however you can.’

In the margin Rhones had written ‘ _Exactly_.’


End file.
